Five Soccer Players Named In Top 20 Of SBC

Five North Texas soccer players have been named among TopDrawerSoccer.com's Top 20 Players of the Sun Belt Conference, the outlet announced Wednesday. North Texas and Denver shared the conference lead with five players named apiece.

Five North Texas soccer players have been named among TopDrawerSoccer.com's Top 20 Players of the Sun Belt Conference, the outlet announced Wednesday. North Texas and Denver shared the conference lead with five players named apiece.

Michelle Young ranks as the No. 3 player in the Sun Belt Conference, after leading North Texas in goals to this point of the season, with 12, which leads the Sun Belt and ranks 19th in the nation. Young is the first player since 2007 to score 12 or more goals for the Mean Green, and ranks 8th in career goals with 28.

Ellen Scarfone ranks as the No. 6 player in the conference, and co-leads North Texas with seven assists. She is tied for the league lead with five assists in league games, and is one assist away from entering North Texas' career assists top 10. Scarfone was a preseason All-Sun Belt pick.

Nikki Crocco was named the No. 8 player in the Belt, on the power of her seven goals and five assists through only 12 games this season. Crocco scored both goals against SMU, including the 87th minute game winner, and had a hat trick that took only 3:34 of game time against Grambling.

Ranking 12th in the conference is Kelsey Perlman, who co-leads North Texas with seven assists and co-leads the Sun Belt with five assists in league games. Perlman has five assists in her last four conference games.

Goalkeeper Jackie Kerestine was named as the league's 13th-best player and the league's second-rated goalkeeper. Kerestine leads the Sun Belt Conference with a miniscule 0.43 Goals Against Average in league games. She has five shutouts on the season, which is tied for the eighth-most in a single North Texas season.

The complete listing of every conference's top 20 players can be found here.

North Texas hosts UALR on Thursday, October 20 at the Mean Green Soccer Complex, with kick set to 7 p.m.